Carpentry and Woodworking - protecting and highlighting the grain

Our dishwasher was getting no power to it and we discovered
that some of the wires had melted. The dishwasher is a Kenmore and about 6 months old. We noticed a smell in the past week - that we now know was caused by the melting of the wires. We are thankful it didn't cause a fire.

Any suggestions on what could have caused the wires to
melt, how to stop if from occurring again or other advice would be appreciated.

Thank you.

Hi all, I've never done any woodworking and I need some advice on finishing one piece of wood.

What I have:

It's just a wooden plank about 1'x4'. medium brown color and it feels very soft & porous. I have no idea what kind of wood it is. It looks like it's never had any kind of stain, oil, or polish of any kind. The grain seems to be at an angle to the surface so that light reflecting off the sides of the individual grain layers produces bright, shiny highlights. I think it could be represented like this: //////////. If anything hard touches the surface it seems to bend down the top edges of each of the grain layers and the surface is just ordinary, flat, non-reflective wood, like this: ////---------/////.

What I want:

I'd like to finish the wood to bring out the depth in the grain. Specifically, I want to preserve the highlights. I don't know how the wood was cut originally but it is smooth except for some slight marring caused by objects sliding on the surface. However, I don't think I can sand it in any way without damaging the edges of the grain layers. Also, I fear that sanding could fill in the microscopic spaces between the grain layers and prevent the light from reflecting there. I don't know if I should use oil or wax or varnish or what. After treating it to bring out the highlights, it should have some kind of durable finish applied so that the surface doesn't get marred by every object placed on it, it's really soft. I have no extra pieces to experiment on.

I'd appreciate any help, as I said, I've never done this before. Thanks.

I'll be glad to offer any advice I can, but it would help to know two things:

1- What kind of wood is it..

2- What you plan to do with it - in other words, what does it need to be protected from?

Here ar some links to help you in identifying the wood itself.

http://martyswoodshop.com/idwood.htm

http://www.woodworking.org/WC/woodsampler.html

http://www.wood-worker.com/properties.htm#top

Unfortunately I have absolutely no idea what kind of wood it is or where it cam from. It was given to me by a neighbor when he moved. He was using it as a shelf I think in his garage so it must be something cheap. I was going to keep it as a shelf but the grain highlights look so nice I wanted to keep them looking good. As I said, the wood is very soft and every little bump flattens some of the grain ruining the highlights. I just wanted it to be covered with something so hard objects put on it wouldn't leave dull spots.

I've changed my mind about trying to finish this piece of wood. I tried several kinds of oil on the back as well as a "wood finisher" and they all soaked in so thoroughly that you can hardly tell anything was applied.